Dead by Dawn

The onboard systems had failed, warning lights flashing across the screen that served as the control room's window. 'Engines failures', 'Electron storm imminent', 'Nuclear Fallout warning', 'Destroyed friendly units', 'Shadows' repeating in an endless loop. They were not expecting to see the entire fleet sent here before them annihilated, slowly falling into orbit around the planet in a grotesque parody of rings. At least one of the ships had been successful in launching the Seismic Disruption heads, the mushroom clouds still growing and threatening to exit the atmosphere.

They had also done a stellar job launching salvo after salvo onto the surface Citadel, the smoke from the fires spreading across the surface clearly visible even from this distance away. "Aryawn, report." The disjointed static-filled comms relay sounded through the stunned control center.

"There isn't anything left." He responded, voice flat and expressionless.

"They were successful then? The infection contained on the planet?" Anlyth questioned.

"No, I mean there isn't anything left, Sir. The fleet, it's gone. All our systems have been shut down to life support and comms only the moment we warped out of the Portal Nexus." He said, issuing orders to begin scanning for survivors.

"You mean to tell me, that a fleet of several hundred warships are gone. Thousands of lives, gone."

"Yes Sir."

"Report the status of the infection."

"Seems only the Citadel was destroyed, though the fires are spreading quickly. Planetary surface was also cracked, and immense amounts of volcanic activity visible from our distance. It would seem just from the visual we have that they failed in eradicating the infection from this world."

"Begin investigating why." Anlyth's voice dripped with a fury seldom heard, though none could blame him for his anger. The War had been turning quickly as another Shadow appeared amongst the Five we were already fighting. Calling itself Balance, it was a particularly cruel one compared to the others so far. Wrath was straightforward, though entirely overwhelming, Raven was subtle flying under all radars, and by the time she was noticed, it was always too late. Patience was a siege mastermind, when it took a world there was no taking it back.

Defeat after defeat, the Arch Valkyrie was justified in his fury. Desperation and hopelessness had begun to fill the air of the control center, well, all the Children across the The Quartet's dominion felt it these days. That uncertainty, that loss of control, the knowledge that even our own gods were failing to push back this darkness. Well, it didn't do much for morale.

"I don't think we are going to need to, Sir." Aryawn said as something shook the ship, knocking out the life support system. The screen's warning text changed as new words scrawled across with the same weight as the headsman's axe. 'Why don't you come down here? I want to play.'

***

"Requesting extraction immediately! Mayday! Mayday!" Aryawn screamed into the useless comms set, the sound of pulsing gunfire and the crack of lightning being cast just outside the control room's heavy metal doors did nothing but cause even more panic on the bridge. "Mayday, ship pulled to planet's surface! Requesting extraction immediately!"

"Request... Unable... Nexus... reinforcements." The comms sets were nothing but static as that Shadow laughed. Audible, everywhere, nowhere, a shade that filled the mind. All sensors before they hit the crust indicated that there was nothing around their immediate area, they had figured whatever grabbed them and pulled them down with the force of god, had at least pulled them down in an area of relative peace.

By Syn's divine light, they were wrong, catastrophically wrong. Whatever this Shadow had done, had changed all sensor data to give false measurements, false positives, and incorrect atmospheric data. Everything, it hijacked everything without any effort, the moment they touched cursed earth the hull of the ship was swarmed.

Corrupted, mutated, Children unrecognizable. Fleshing fell from bone, screaming as the Shadows warped their bodies before our eyes, forcing them to rip their hands away to be nothing more than sythes as they punctured the hull like a tin can. Sympathetic response systems built into the ship fried the few thousand that were clinging to the ship, only to be replaced but a few seconds later by the next wave.

Their screams piercing through the thick armor heedless of physical boundaries, this Shadow had somehow found the few Brownies living here and turned them into disturbingly effective psychological instruments of war. Their voices weaving lies and fear into the minds of the crew, breaking them, causing them to turn on their own. "Mayday! Requesting immediate extraction!" Aryawn's voice sounded far louder now that the gunfire outside the door had silenced.

He knew though, he knew why. He didn't want to think about the faint scratching at the door. He didn't want to think about the quiet voices just outside, familiar and wrong. He didn't want to look at the crew in the control room as they frantically redistributed power to external cannons, laying waste to miles around them, only for the dead to rise again to continue their assault. He didn't want to hear the explosions in distant corridors as safety valves and ordinance were released to vaporize the bodies in them.

With a slow motion, he took off his headset setting on the instument panel before him. Bringing his own power to his fingertips he melted away the cover over a set of three keys. "I won't fail here." The crewmate directly below him looked up, fear in his eyes, wide and buggy.

***

His crew had opted out rather than suffer whatever the Shadow had in store for them. Taking the time to face them toward the sunrise, engaging the saferoom protocol. The control room was it's own impenetrable geode, though without its life support systems, this was little more than a glorified tomb. The sound of his changed crew hammering away at the hull sounded more to him like a distant rainstorm on an old tin roof, trying not to think about it.

He sat, vision fuzzy from the lack of oxygen, he needed to send back the information to Anlyth and Syn back on the front. All the data the ship had collected, the registry, the crew information, the harddrives, and system information. Anything they could use, the sound of a rythmic tapping caught his attention. A quick and slow series of sounds, the sound of the Shadow laughing filled his ears again.

Code, even in his half delirious state he still decoded it out of habit. "Give up, you'll enjoy your new life." Suppressing a shudder, he heard the static in the headset and a familiar voice. He snatched it quickly, though too quickly. Falling against the control console, his legs too weak to let him rise again. With a surety that he just tore one of his wings, he put the headset over his ears.

"Talk to me Aryawn." He could hear the low oxygen alarm going off in the crashed battleship, on radar he was in the control center. The pulsing warnings of Miasma echoed throughout the halls of the dead. The hull having been shredded by the Shadow Touched Children, no sign of uninfected left wandering the ship.

"Not" He gasped for air, "much to talk about, Sir. There isn't so much point to it if the stars above us are as dead as we are."

"Don't talk like that, we are getting you home." It was a lie, but he had hoped he would believe it. He needed him to, he had already lost far too many on that gods forsaken planet, even if he could save a single one, he would.

He laughed a bitter sound, followed immediately by a fit of coughing. "Syn and the Queen would never allow it, Sir. The few left on the ship are surrounded, just like I am. We might as well slow this Shadow down as much as we can." Anlyth didn't have the heart to Aryawn that he was the only one left. The defense of the ship had been admirable, the landscape around the hulking behemoth nothing but glassed sand and earth, scorched bodies and vaporated buildings. They had lasted through a swarm of Shadow touched that would have leveled a city in moments, a full thirty hours they were able to hold out.

"We won't let you do that, you don't have the authorization for that. We already have an extraction team coming." That wasn't a lie at least, there was another fleet coming, one that was receiving all the information being transmitted to them by Aryawn. They wouldn't fall so easily as the last.

"No, it's too late. It's armed." The comms line filled with static from the storms over the planet's surface. "Don't worry, we'll be dead by dawn. Hopefully, we can take this Shadow with us."

"How did you active it? You shouldn't have." He began, but Aryawn only cut him off with a very out of character shooshing noise.

"You know, Anlyth, Sir. I think I understand the full beauty of the things Syn and the rest of the Quartet had made for us. I still remember the first time I spread my wings. It was a grassy field just outside the Citadel, I loved the feeling of the fronds brushing the bottoms of them. I relished the freedom I felt as they burned when I rose in the air. I swore I could have heard the Great Mother's song as I rose higher and higher. I was so young then, carefree in the loving arms of Syn. Like a listless cloud in vacant skies, endless cerulean blue in crystal skies. I felt at peace in the vast seas of the sky, feeling the warmth of the sun on my skin."

"Well, let's get you back to that field again." Anlyth tired.

"Nah, I'll see you on distant shores, old friend." The deadman's hand activated as Aryawn let go of it. Deep in the bowels of the planet, the device responded.

***

The fleet appeared out of the Portal Nexus already targeting the planet with innumerable artillery salvos. Ship after ship entering, rejoining in formation preparing to lay waste to the surface of the world. They were denied that satisfaction as the world cracked in a soundless boom, the shockwave pushing aside the ion storms in the upper atmosphere like an exasperated professor to their desk. The world became a second sun in the skies as its atmosphere ignited burning away any chance at survival.

Anlyth sat heavily in his chair, rubbing his temple as he watched the world burn. A distant look on his face, a stare that saw everything and nothing. "Dead by dawn, Aryawn. I'll see you on distant shores indeed."